Dick Durbin kills successful public school voucher system

[rbell]

Figures. What a corrupt piece of trash this communist is.

SOURCE

Here's the story: There's a voucher system in Washington DC. About 1,700 DC students are participating. These students are excelling. Their reading and math scores are way above those of students trapped in the abysmal DC government schools.

The students and parents just love the voucher system. The teacher's unions absolutely HATE it. Now usually teacher's unions attack voucher programs on the basis that the programs take money away from government schools. They can't use this argument here because the DC voucher system is funded by the federal government. The actual result is that the DC schools have even more money per student after the voucher students bail.

Who came to the rescue? None other than Illinois Senator Dick Durbin. Remember that $1.1 trillion dollar spending program passed over the weekend? Durban had a very quiet little amendment hiding in that bill. The amendment killed all funding for the DC voucher program. Durbin's Christmas gift for teacher's unions.

 

[Johnv]

The public school system, or, should I say, the unions that run the public school system, don't like competition. Vouchers foster competition.

 

[rbell]

Dick Durbin doesn't care if children are illiterate, aborted, or whatever...as long as he gets re-elected.

They don't get more evil than him.

 

[Johnv]

They don't get more evil than him.

Alas, I'm sure they do.

 

[ReformedBaptist]

How do they compete with homeschoolers?

 

[rbell]

How do they compete with homeschoolers?

If Durbin has his way, homeschoolers will be violating the law.

 

[JohnDeereFan]

Liberals don't understand that every time they do things like this, they're just pouring gas on the fire that's going to sweep them out in 2010/2012.

 

[Crabtownboy]

If you look at Baptist history you will see that those who support vouchers are the liberals. If you are pro-vouchers you have abandoned traditional Baptist beliefs in the separation of church and state. Also, it means you support vouchers for Islamic schools within the country. Why? Because you cannot support vouchers for just protestants, or just Catholics, but for everyone.

 

[preachinjesus]

Vouchers are a difficult program to allow on a consistent basis. We all agree we need better public schools and better prepared public school teachers. Paying property taxes doesn't automatically entitle us to the proceeds from our taxes. If we really want the best public schools we are hard pressed to see a benefit by denying them the money we can use to support them.

Of course the salient point is that education is not a right, though if we desire it for our children it is a guarantee in the United States. We are a blessed nation because we can educate our children in a system that has a fairly level playing field. Denying the public schools the public money needed to support them seems to be a silly prospect. Now can we reasonably say that there are other ways to push money towards our schools? Certainly. But I have often said that anytime a person who advocates vouchers and then votes for public funding of the new sports stadium has a big problem.

We need to have schools at are monuments to scholasticism and teachers that are trained to compete with the best and brightest among us. To deny them the funds they need to operate so that people who decide to remove their children (often on perfectly legitimate grounds) from that free public system seems to deny us our ability to teach with excellence. If you desire for your child to a great, private education that is certainly your right. But in doing so we must realize that we can't take away from those who desire to give their children great, public education.

Vouchers are a tough sell imho. We need not demonize people over the issue either way though.

Editted to add: I am a big fan of charter schools and a classical education.

 

[Revmitchell]

The public school system is a money pit because it is being mishandled country wide. It doesn't need to cost as much as it does. And the average tax payer does not have one more dime to give in taxes to anyone. The government has no business running education. It only messes it up.

 

[Crabtownboy]

The public school system is a money pit because it is being mishandled country wide. It doesn't need to cost as much as it does. And the average tax payer does not have one more dime to give in taxes to anyone. The government has no business running education. It only messes it up.

Did the public school system mess you up?

 

[targus]

Did the public school system mess you up?

It sure is messing up a bunch of kids in Detroit.

The high school graduation rate in the Detroit Public School System is about 25%.

A recent standardized math test showed that only 1 in 3 sixth graders in Detroit Public Schools could correctly subtract 75 from 301.

This poor performance has been going on for decades.

 

[matt wade]

If you look at Baptist history you will see that those who support vouchers are the liberals. If you are pro-vouchers you have abandoned traditional Baptist beliefs in the separation of church and state. Also, it means you support vouchers for Islamic schools within the country. Why? Because you cannot support vouchers for just protestants, or just Catholics, but for everyone.

Who here has said that vouchers can only be used to go to a Baptist or Christian school? I personally don't think that government should pay for anyone's schooling. I think we should do away with public schools and not have any voucher type system. If the government is going to pay for education though, a voucher is the way to go. If a person wants to use the voucher to send their kid to the local auto mechanics school, so be it. If they use it for a catholic school, an islamic school, a wiccan school, or whatever, so be it. If we are going to hand people money for their kids schooling, allow the people to decide how the money gets spent. Heck, if we are going to use vouchers, and people want to homeschool, they should get to keep the money.

 

[JohnDeereFan]

If you look at Baptist history you will see that those who support vouchers are the liberals. If you are pro-vouchers you have abandoned traditional Baptist beliefs in the separation of church and state.

OK. I'll bite: how does the belief that taxpayers should be able to use their own tax money as they see fit "abandoning traditional Baptist beliefs in the seperation of church and state"?

This ought to be amusing.

Also, it means you support vouchers for Islamic schools within the country. Why? Because you cannot support vouchers for just protestants, or just Catholics, but for everyone.

Of course. Why would you assume that we think that Muslim citizens are any less enititled than anyone else?

 

[Alcott]

Also, it means you support vouchers for Islamic schools within the country. Why?

If you support the idea of churches being 501.c.3 tax exempt entities, then you support that idea for mosques equally having such exemption entitlements. So are you in favor of churches-- including the smallest ones with no staff and a single run-down building-- having to pay taxes, which would quickly bankrupt many of them, or are you willing to support islamic organization through extra taxes?

 

[Crabtownboy]

If you support the idea of churches being 501.c.3 tax exempt entities, then you support that idea for mosques equally having such exemption entitlements. So are you in favor of churches-- including the smallest ones with no staff and a single run-down building-- having to pay taxes, which would quickly bankrupt many of them, or are you willing to support islamic organization through extra taxes?

Apples and oranges. One is taxing an institution. The other is using my tax dollars to support institutions that I do not approve of being supported by my tax dollar.

 

[targus]

Apples and oranges. One is taxing an institution. The other is using my tax dollars to support institutions that I do not approve of being supported by my tax dollar.

No - it is "not taxing" an institution - so by extension your tax dollars do support that institution to the extent that it saves on taxes not paid.

 

[Martin]

Figures. What a corrupt piece of trash this communist is.

I don't think Durbin is a communist nor do I think calling him a "piece of trash" is Biblical (Titus 3:1-2). However calling him "corrupt" is just speaking the truth. He is opposed to vouchers because he is bought and paid for by the teachers unions. They oppose vouchers because they want to rid the system of accountability. Vouchers allow parents to send their children to good schools instead of trapping them in poor, often dangerous, public schools. Durbin does not have to worry about that. I'm sure his children, and grandchildren, are well taken care of in private schools or the best public schools. He wants, he demands, that choice for himself but he denies it to the poor he claims to represent. Yes, Richard Durbin is corrupt. Corrupt to the core. As are most of the Democrats and Republicans in DC.

 

[Martin]

Who here has said that vouchers can only be used to go to a Baptist or Christian school? I personally don't think that government should pay for anyone's schooling. I think we should do away with public schools and not have any voucher type system.

==That is a terrible idea. The 17th century Puritans had a version of public schools as have other Christians in American history. The Puritan focus on education put them years ahead of others. The schools are not the problem. The problem is the federal government getting involved. Leave the public schools to the states, cities, and counties and things will get better.

Btw...the federal government has no legal way to involve itself in the public school systems of the states (Amendment 10).

 

[Revmitchell]

==That is a terrible idea. The 17th century Puritans had a version of public schools as have other Christians in American history. The Puritan focus on education put them years ahead of others. The schools are not the problem. The problem is the federal government getting involved. Leave the public schools to the states, cities, and counties and things will get better.

Btw...the federal government has no legal way to involve itself in the public school systems of the states (Amendment 10).

Amen! :thumbs: